Richard Johnson’s Day 3 Cheltenham Tips: Richard’s St Patrick’s Thursday picks

The Cheltenham Festival enters day 3 and it's St Patricks Day, where the Emerald Isle descends on Prestbury Park. We've asked two-time Cheltenham Gold Cup winning jockey Richard Johnson to give us his thoughts and tips ahead of the day's racing.

So here we go with Richard Johnson's Day 3 Cheltenham Tips...

Day 3 - St. Patrick's Thursday

The big race on day three of the Cheltenham Festival is the Stayers Hurdle at 4pm.

Richard views the market leaders in the race, talking about Teahupoo’s preparation being the same as last season, coming straight to the Festival with no prep race.

“I can see why they’ve done the same as last year, he’s best fresh. I can also see why he’s favourite, but it’s a more open race than last year’s.

Home By The Lee is still improving, and this is the most open contest in the Championship races.

I laughed at Langer Dan’s price given he hasn’t shown any form this season, but when he got beat in the Martin Pipe, he was behind Galopin Des Champs!

It’s amazing when you look at some of these horses, they come back year after year and run well at the Festival, if he runs in the Stayers, he wouldn’t be the most silly each-way price.”

In the Ryanair Chase, Il Est Francais catches Richard’s eye.

“If there’s one horse I’ve watched over the last 18 months it’s him. I’d really love to ride him over fences. He was brilliant in the King George. His fractional times at Kempton were crazy for a 3-mile chase and his jumping is so exuberant.”

Caldwell Potter, who runs in the two-and-a-half-mile Novice Handicap on Thursday (2pm), is another that Richard’s sweet on.

“He cost a huge amount of money, but the horse doesn’t know that.

He’s a Grade 1 winner over hurdles, and whilst he’s been a bit disappointing over fences, he’s a very good each-way bet, with course form and campaigned to get experience, he’s had some harder races and learned plenty.

He needed three runs to get into the race and horses with Graded experience when dropping down into handicap company is telling and I think he could be the class horse in the race we’ve forgotten about.”

Finally, we asked Richard before the Festival who his best bet of the week was. His answer? The Oli Greenall-trained Jagwar, who runs in the Festival Plate at 4.40pm.

“Jagwar looks very progressive, has course form, and probably still in front of the handicapper. The form has been franked at Bangor first time out, and is definitely a horse with the right profile.”

Richard will be on the track with us daily on Betfred TV, and we'll be covering his Cheltenham Tips here at Betfred Insights each day of the Festival.